Of Names And Growing Up
by angryoctopus
Summary: AKA: Four times Quinn Fabray told someone to call her Quinn, and one time she didn't.


_A/N: As always, a huge thank you to Cas (GallifreyIsCalling) for being my beta/fangirl. This started with a chat breakdown of Prom-Asaurus and quickly morphed into headcanons out the ass for Quinn. Rated T for: **internalized fatophobia **(is that the_ term?)**_, oodles of self hatred, and a wee bit of language._**_ Your thoughts are greatly appreciated and enjoy! :)_

1. Mr. Fredericks

Mckinley smells. There's an acrid stench of sweat and glass cleaner with a sugary undertone of what she could swear is Slushie that tickles at her new nose and settles at the back of her throat. Her flats (They'll be sneakers in two weeks. There's a sign-up sheet for the Cheerleading team that's calling her name.) stick slightly on a patch of blue-tinted tile, they _squish_ ever so slightly when she picks her foot up and continues to follow her parents down the hall to the Principal's office.

The secretary is fat. Quinn can barely suppress the shudder that aches to run through her. Instead, she turns her head, glaring at the carpet with her fists clenched, and marches silently behind her mother into the office.

The balding man behind the desk is sweating too much for her to be completely comfortable with but at least he's not fat. She sits down.

Her parents and the man go through the motions. Yes, she would like to take advanced classes, AP is wonderful, thank you. Yes, she plans to try out for sports. The cheerleading program looked promising. Do you have a ballet class here? Yes? Wonderful. Oh, and one more thing, sir.

Her mother fills him in on who she is. Quinn Fabray. That's it. She doesn't want that _other_name associated with her. And, yes, you'll inform them? Oh, wonderful, wonderful.

Quinn sighs. Yes, things are _wonderful__._

Her first class is Honors English. Quinn thinks it's stupid because she hates reading. Reading is for losers who can't get a date. (Lucy loves to read. English has always been her favorite class.) Her teacher looks up at her when she walks in twenty minutes late. He smiles at her, gesturing to an empty seat in the front. He's still smiling when he says, "You must be Lucy."

Her heart drops to the floor and Quinn (Lucy Caboosey, Lucy Caboosey, choo choo!) freezes. She grabs at her stomach, hands fisting in her dress (A babydoll because they were supposed to be able to hide those five pounds she never could seem to shake and, god, _how__does__he__know__? _Can he see the stretch marks? Can he tell she's had a nosejob?) and just barely manages to choke out a soft, "It's Quinn. My name is Quinn. Don't call me that."

2. Judy Fabray

It's a Thursday night and Quinn's in her room, practicing for Cheerios. It's been hardly a month and Coach has already made her Head Cheerleader. It feels good, being on top where she was always supposed to be. (Don't think that means she can slack off now. She's knows that Santana is pissed she got the spot and what it means for her if she doesn't watch her back. Trust no bitch; she learned that from her sister.)

There's a thud, the front door slamming, followed by her father's footsteps up the stairs. She knows that means that dinner is ready and she needs to be at the table, sitting quietly, before he gets back downstairs. She lets her leg drop from the stretch and pads down the stairs, making sure that her hair is still perfect in her high pony before entering the dining room.

Her mother has the roast already sitting on the table and is placing her father's tumbler of scotch next to his plate. Quinn grabs the glasses off the counter (water for her, red wine for her mother) and is just placing those, too, when her mother speaks.

"Oh, good, Lucy. Just put those down and we can eat." It's so much like that first day in English that her head spins. She grabs at her stomach, looks down at her thighs (Holy sweet hell, look at those Thunder Thighs! They look like cottage cheese. Gross!) and tries not to get sick. Her mother is by her side dithering about, hands hovering over Quinn like she doesn't know if it's safe to touch. She's apologizing but it all falls on deaf ears.

It's not until her father comes in the room, voice booming asking her What's wrong, Quinnie? that she snaps out of it.

"Yes, I'm Quinn." She sits at the table, followed slowly by her mother and father and they begin to eat. They all pretend that she doesn't mutter that she is Quinn, Quinn Fabray, just Quinn, every so often.

3. Amy Fabray

Quinn tries not to look in the mirror when she's changing anymore. It's the one place where the biggest regrets in her life can mock her endlessly. With her clothes off she can still see Lucy in the white lines that marr her stomach and inner thighs, she can see Beth in the still-stretched skin of her tummy and the pink lines that the cocoa butter couldn't save her from. They yell at her when she dares to look. She's started changing in the closet.

They aren't the only ones yelling at her these days. While Lucy and Beth remind her of how far she's fallen, the family tiara collection screams of how far she still needs to go.

There are three generations of Hamilton queens on those shelves. They sit there, glittering and shiny from her maternal grandmother's Miss Ohio to her older sister's own Prom Queen crown.

She's just picking up her mom's Senior Homecoming Queen crown when her sister walks in. Amy is everything that Quinn isn't. She's always been the better daughter, succeeding when it seemed Quinn could only fail. Where Quinn had to get a nose job and nearly starve herself to look the way she does, Amy was naturally slim and perfect. She doesn't even have to dye her hair.

Amy comes over, grabs the crown and places it carefully on Quinn's head. She leans into the mirror, chin resting on Quinn's shoulder and smiles at their reflection.

"I can't wait till you bring yours home, Lucy." Amy smiles innocently, like she doesn't know that she's Quinn now, like she doesn't know that Lucy is just a bad memory that they _don__'__t__talk__about__._ Quinn's thrown back five years when she was still Lucy and Amy was still a Fabray.

Quinn had been sitting in the stuffy den in her favorite chair reading her favorite book when Amy and her parents had blown through, cooing and smiling. Lucy, Lucy, did you see? Amy won Prom Queen, isn't that wonderful? Look how beautiful she is, Lucy. And yes, of _course_, we're putting the crown in with the others. Amy looks at her and smirks, "I can't wait till you bring _yours_ home, Lucy." It's not meant as anything but a reminder that she never will. Because Lucy is not Amy and Lucy will never win Prom Queen.

But Quinn isn't Lucy. And she definitely isn't Amy. (She looks at Amy's belly, round and larger than her normal size two. She's pregnant with her husband's baby. Amy can do things right, at least.) She's Quinn, though. And Quinn Fabray _will_ be Prom Queen if it's the last thing she does.

"It's Quinn, Amy. You know that."

Amy just ruffles her hair and leaves the room.

4. Finn Hudson

It's a week until Prom. Quinn has her game face on and keeps trying to convince herself that she's a shoo-in for Queen, that she deserves this. (That poster is sitting on her desk, face down, mocking her whenever she's in the room. She still can't bring herself to destroy it.) It's not working.

Finn is at Rachel's locker, laughing at something Rachel has said while she gazes back lovingly. Quinn tries not to let it smart too much and completely refuses to think about why the two talking would hurt at all. Quinn Fabray doesn't hurt.

She's rifling through her locker when he finally makes it over. It's hard not to sound too bitter when she reminds him that their campaign is completely _screwed__._ Sometimes it's really hard to remember why she puts up with- _ohmyGod__, __what __is __that__._

He's got..._her_ in his hand and _how_ did he get that. She tries not to yell at him, or worse cry, when she asks why. Can't speak when he tells her that that's the first time he's really seen her. Her thank you is soft and _God__, __why __is __this __so __hard__._

Later, when she's trying on her Prom dress, _again_, he texts. She pulls it up and freezes.

_Hey__, __Lucy__. Ur beautiful and __I __love __you__._

Finn picks up the phone after two rings and hasn't even gotten out a _hello_ before she's yelling.

"_What_ do you think you're playing at? You think- you think that just because you have that _damn __picture_ you get to call me that? That's not how it works, Finn. And I swear if you ever call me that again- I _swear_ we'll be over. For good." Quinn hangs up quickly and falls onto the bed. She jumps up when she realizes the dress is still on and takes it off, back to the mirror and eyes anywhere but down. When she's lying in bed she tries hard not to cry. Lucy doesn't deserve any more of her tears.

She burns the poster the next day.

1. Bree Hernandez

"L. Quinn Fabray?" Quinn. It's been a while since she's thought of herself as Quinn. Hell, it's been a long time since she's _been _Quinn. Or at least, the Quinn that pretended that's all she was.

But, she really isn't that girl anymore, she was hardly that girl at all.

L. Quinn Fabray has changed a lot in her teenage year. She's grown. She's not that chubby girl that hid Harry Potter books from her mom and had food thrown at her in middle school. She isn't that stone cold bitch that pretended that everything was alright and smiled through it like she was supposed to. L. Quinn Fabray thanks God she isn't that girl.

If she thought hard she could probably pinpoint the moment she went from Quinn Fabray (Queen Bitch, Head Cheerleader Extraordinaire.) into this other girl she is now. (She could probably briefly summarize her great fall from the top, too.)

Maybe it started when she got pregnant and suddenly, the world didn't revolve around her anymore. Maybe it was when Finn told her that Lucy was beautiful or when _Rachel __Berry_ came to her, braving the cigarette smoke and Skank glares, just to tell her that they needed her. All she knows is that when she flopped onto her bed Prom night and realized that she _didn__'__t __need_ Prom Queen, things had irrevocably changed for the better.

And maybe she's still not Lucy. She's not sweet and loving and trusting to a fault; she's been jaded far too much for that. But, wow, does she love who she is now.

"L. Quinn Fabray?" The girl who says her name is smiling wide at her. She's got an eyebrow piercing that glints in the morning sun and a tattoo that's unnoticeable until her long sleeve falls back with her movement.

"L. Quinn Fabray" moves forward to take the manilla folder out of her hand. The girl (Hi! My name is _BREE_ it reads over her breast.) is shorter than her with a shock of pink hair and somehow she's reminded of Rachel Berry. (Pink is your color, Quinn. It's mine, too, but I'm not sure I could ever pull off pink hair as well as you.) She tries to smile warmly at the shorter girl, tries not to let her hands quake so much as she sticks out the right one in greeting.

"It's Lucy, actually." Bree nods, crosses something out on a clipboard, and waves her off with a bright, "Welcome to Yale, Lucy Quinn Fabray."

She knows there isn't much in a name. She knows that were she to go by George Clooney she'd still be the same person she's always been. (Her therapist reminds her of this all the time.) She knows there is so much more to her than "Lucy Quinn Fabray". To a little blonde girl in Upstate New York that she visits at least twice a month. she's Kinnie. In about five years she's going to be Ms. Fabray, Drama teacher at Westhaven High School; in ten she'll be a Professor.

Still, this girl she is now is better than any she's been. She's gone from Queen Bitch to Pregnant Slut to Almost Normal to Crazy Bitch to Badass to Paralyzed to who she is now: Lucy Quinn Fabray: Almost Prom Queen, Not Paralyzed, Yale Freshman. And today, it has never been a brighter day.

_Just so you guys know, I'm now running an blog type thing. It begins where this leaves off, so go 'head, check it out at justlucynocaboosey . tumblr . com and ask Quinn something!_


End file.
